I was just tryin'
To take my little trip to Vodkasodaburg
Can I please be anywhere else in the world
Except for here?
1. We have reached our penultimate Barfly Session. One more next week (to round off a full year) and then we'll have a rest. No fears though, I'll still be around. Somewhere in between stations and floating in the ether. I'll always be happy to hear your thoughts, your recommendations and your musings. There's a communications box towards the bottom of the page which you can use until such time as the t'interweb closes it's digital curtains on this blog. Until then, it's never... really... over! But on to tonight's session and as always we have some of this, some of that and some of the other. Tonight we'll begin with this spikey little firecracker from 2006. It comes off the superbly titled album Love travels at illegal speeds. A good rouser to start us off.
1. Graham Coxon
You & I
2. OK so... back in the late nineteen nineties and early two thousands (when I could easily run up three flights of stairs without breaking sweat) there was an older guy we used to know as KG who used to sell cheap amphetamines and ket in our local boozer. He also used to sing fabulously well on karaoke nights. His version of Elton John's "I guess that's why they call it the blues" was a particular highlight. But why is this relevant? Well truth be told it ain't really but this song and it's title from 1971 always takes me back to some wild lock-ins from those times and it's 110% funky so (to me anyway) that's as good a reason as any to throw it in tonight's mixer.
2. The Nite-Liters
K-Jee
3. In 2016 A Tribe Called Quest reunited for their album We Got It from Here... Thank You 4 Your Service. The timing was impeccable. Trump had just installed his considerable rump into The White House and tensions were starting to pick up. This track exemplifies those times and pretty much where we all currently sit round the table. Air Sirens and police sirens sound out behind lyrics telling tales of oppression, gentrification and fake news. It's a true work of wonder. Phife Dawg features heavily on this and really sadly he died before the album was completed and released.
3. A Tribe Called Quest
We The People
4. "The past is our knowledge/the present our mistake/And the future we always leave too late." Sometimes I think Paul Weller's lyrics aren't appreciated quite enough. From social viewpoints, to scathing political commentaries and then sometimes just bittersweet lines about love and pain, Weller does it all and he does it brilliantly at times. Switching up from The Jam to The Style Council was a bold move but Café Bleu from 1984 is a fine album and a showcase for Weller's jazz and soul influences. Track four tonight is My Ever Changing Moods. I was merely 5 years old when this was released but it still sounds as fresh as spring daisies.
4. The Style Council
My Ever Changing Moods
5. Nothing from The Fox this week so it's another chance to put something else on here that you might not have heard before and it will follow on quite nicely from The Style Council who we've just heard. This next song is from Boz Scaggs and I think it's from the very early seventies but I'd have to check that to be sure. "I'll send you my best/Of regards and the rest/I'll leave up to your own sense of time" is a wonderful lyric and it rolls into a triumphant chorus. See what you make of this.
5. Boz Scaggs
I'll Be Long Gone
6. Now I'm pretty certain you won't have heard this one before. Last time I looked, it had very little plays on youuuuutuuuube which is a surprise as this song continues to amaze me even after countless listens. Life is full of endless depths and this track from Mimi Gilbert frames that completely. It's so intimate. In fact, I was so smitten with the song after I'd heard it, I sent Mimi a message asking if she'd mind me putting it on one of our Barfly Sessions. There's a moment around the 3 minute mark where she sings "When will I see that all I need/Is right here" and the drums kick in and I feel every single word. Please give this song a few listens to let it soak into your evening skin.
6. Mimi Gilbert
Dark Storm
7. This song crawled into my head just the other day and I thought "Hey, that's one for the session this week" and here we are. Yes, yes I remembered it. It's a rare sombre moment from Beastie Boys (namely Adam Yauch in this case) and it's a reflective and poignant step away from our worldly chaos. It's kind of trippy and I love it. So there we have another Barfly session completed and that's us until next week. Scroll away through previous weeks if you wanna be a rebel and stay up really late. A pair of earphones, a bottle of something cold and The Horse & Feather Barfly Sessions. You should want for nothing else on a starry April night. Be good to yourselves people. As always it's been a heap of fun and I look forward to meeting up in 7 days time. Byeeee for now. x
7. Beastie Boys
I Don't Know
